Character Application and Information Sheet
NS Nation Name: Cybernetic Socialist Republics
Character Name: Robert Nelson
Character Gender: Male
Character Age: 42
Character Date of Birth: January 9th, 1917
Character Position/Role/Job:
- Junior Executive at U.S. Steel (1937-1942)
- Lieutenant Junior Grade (1942-43)
- Lieutenant (1943-45)
- Lieutenant Commander (1945-53)
- Commander (1953-)
Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs (1940-1942)
U.S. Naval Reserve (1942-)
Class 1 Senator from New York (1953-1959)
Governor of New York (1959-)
Character State of Residence: New York
Character Party Affiliation: Republican (1952-)
Faceclaim: Eugene McCarthy
Main Strengths:
Anti-Fascist Cold Warrior -
Took the job to become Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs after seeing the tentacles of Nazism and fascism spread into Latin America and signed up to fight for his country through the U.S. Naval Reserve when Pearl Harbor was attacked. At the conclusion of WW2, he joined the Ford Motor Company to fight Fascism on the economic front and in congress he stood in staunch opposition to the spread of Nazi tyranny and backed both foreign aid and military interventions
Progressive Hamiltonian -
Believes in a strong federal government capable of guiding economic development through supporting the growth of big business and industry, with any efforts to prevent abuses being about providing cushioning for the "little guy" through social programs rather than restricting the expansion and power of business. Also supports aggressive federal civil rights regulation as well and is generally unopposed to expansion of executive power that occurred under FDR. Supported by Liberals and progressives in both parties and respected by moderates.
Charismatic Communicator -
From Academics, to Business to Politics, Robert Nelson has always been an effective and charismatic communicator, capable of arousing appropriate emotions within a variety of settings and knowing how to reach people. Has a knack for changing his vocabulary depending on the audience. Is also more than capable of allowing listeners to come to the conclusions that he wants without having to be explicit about what he supports. Is also very adept at avoiding gasps and talking around issues he rather not address.
Main Weaknesses:
Despised by Dixecrats -
Is utterly despised by dixecrats to the point that they regularly insist that he is a closet communist. While most treat these conspiracies' as ridiculous, there is a growing number of those on the far-right who treat these accusations as legitimate.
Paranoid -
His great ambition to eventually rise to the presidency has lead him to see conspiracies against him all around him, some true and others merely exaggerated by his assuming negative intentions targeted at him where they don't exist. While his charisma has earned him a net positive relationship with the national press, he has an intense antipathy towards state and local press. In private he often calls these people the "Federation of Mediocre Men". He tends to include small business owners, craft union bosses and old money that complain about his policies in this "FoMM"
Privately Non Confrontational -
Despite the fact that he is more than capable of being publicly and effectively confrontational, in private settiings he defaults to a people pleasing attitude that can sometimes severely contrast with his public action in a way that can seem two-faced.
Biography:
Born January 9th, 1917 in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania to a "Lower Upper Class” family, Rober Nelson has always lived a privileged life that has give him enough to never feel any insecurity, but allowed him to build a resentment of those above him and a sympathy for those below him. In general, his sympathy for the lower classes comes not from noblesse oblige, or any type of marxist-like perception of class, but from a realization that they must feel about the wealthy the same way he feels about old money and in intense desire to cycle out old money in favor of those meritorious members of the lower classes. After graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in Economics at the top of his class in Harvard, he moved back to Pittsburg and secured a job as a junior executive at U.S. Steel, slightly ironically, partially due to his father's connections. There he proved himself over the next few years, particularly in managing exports to Latin America, using the Spanish he learned in childhood from a tutor. After a few years in latin america, he was struck by the rising influence of fascism and nazism in the region and was able to convince U.S. Steel to help him land a parallel position as Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs under the Roosevelt administration.
At this point, Robert was not particularly committed to either party, though his ideological leanings were clear to him and he found dixiecrats to be archetypal examples of members of the "Federation of Mediocre Men" in addition to being a fascist fifth column within the United States. When Pearl Harbour was bombed, he could not stomach remaining so far away from the frontlines in corporate boardrooms as an abled bodied man in his 20s, so he soon signed up for the Naval Reserves, working in logistics and earning himself 5 medals. After the end of his active duty in 1946, he took up a job as a Senior Executive at the Ford Motor Company, where he participated in a post-war retooling of the company alongside the "Whiz Kids". There he established a variety of connections with both corporate and labor figures that'd allow him to run a successful campaign for Senate in 1952 for the Republican Party. While In the Senate, he worked with progressives, liberals and moderates across party lines on a variety of domestic policies, while allying with more or less anyone on issues of foreign policy, be it foreign aid or military intervention.
As the conclusion of his senate term came along, Robert first decided to ran for the Governor of New York. He won by a 10 point margin, defeating the incumbent democratic governor. His eyes remaining on the Presidency, his intention was to use the office the the New York Governorship as a base to showcase his policy and bipartisan acumen and win the favor of the New York based national media. To start with, he'd engage in a technocratic plan to remake new york's public services. He'd propose consolidating New York's mix of welfare programs and tax credits into an administratively simple minimum income program that sent direct payments. He'd augment it to support families with a separate system to provide benefits per child. He'd shift money from agricultural subsidies towards an expanded food stamp system. To name only a view of a variety of public service reforms, which, naturally all came with anti-racist policies. The liberal leanings within both the democratic and republican parties of New York meant that his agenda would come out mostly intact from what he proposed. The legislative session would come to a close at the end of march. It was at that point he would start hinting to the press that he was considering running for the Presidency to succeed Jackson.
To begin with, he was going to use the reforms that he had recently passed as governor to set the tone for what his platform would look like heading into the presidential campaign. Put in simple terms, the idea was that he was introducing the power of the market to the goals of the new deal, cutting red tape, but expanding benefits. Making the government's bureaucratic footprint smaller, but more active in improving lives through careful market based interventions. He would try to appeal to liberals and progressives with greater commitments to providing public goods, while satisfying conservatives and libertarians with the promises of deregulation and restrictions on new regulation. As for social and foreign policy, they would be intertwined. He would campaign as an unflinching anti-fascist cold warrior. He would deride dixiecrat politics as a fascist fifth column within the United states and commit strongly to federally enforced civil and voting rights. On the question of the war in Africa, he would avoid undermining the President, but make it clear that a Nelson administration’s position on Africa would call on France to commit to unified self government for Africa, with the aim of incorporating bordering regions up for decolonization.
With that general platform decided upon, Neslon would have to develop a strategy for the primary itself. Where would be the focus, what would be the large game plan. Who he would start contacting for potential endorsements. That, of course, started with Iowa and their senators.He was already on good terms with both having voted with him on the 1957 Civil rights act and would go on to vote for the 1960 as well. It was much the same with New Hampshire's Senators, though they were overtly liberal rather than conservative-moderates willing to allow some progress on civil rights. South Carolina, of course, is where things got more complex. The Republicans hadn't even run a candidate for federal elections in South Carolina since 1956, the Democrats sent a full delegation from south carolina unopposed.
Put simply, the Republican infrastructure and base of support in the state was incredibly weak, which itself presented its own opportunity. It would mean that investments in the states could be potentially very efficient, as fewer people would need to be mobilized for the same number of delegates, provided the winner-take-all state could be won. It also meant that establishing connections with local civil rights campaigners and black churches, to get them to register republican in preparation for the primary, could potentially be effect. Nevermind the loyalty that could potentially be gained for being willing to show up in a state that had largely been abandoned by the National Republican party.
That'd be worth something for campaigning in the rest of the south, even if South Carolina wasn't won, making it a worthwhile investment in any case. Nevada, however, was a less attractive prize. Like South Carolina, Republican representation on the national level was weak, though the republicans were still considerably more competitive. Nevermind the fact that as a proportional state, the reward for winning would mostly be headlines and the previous three states would be useful for that in any case.
Among the states slayed to go for March 1st, the priority was attempting to make use of connections to the African American community to win Georgia, Alabama and Tennessee. Of the other states, Texas, being the largest prize and winner take most would get the most priority. The other states would see visits and speeches, but were lower priority. March 5th states would, similarly get visits, but being only 4 days after the March 1st states, the assumption was that the start of the week would do most of the heavy lifting, especially since all but maine were proportional. Rather, more effort would be spent on Michigan, responsible for the vast majority of delegates up for March 8 and a winner-take-most state.
But perhaps the most critical step of the campaign would take place two weeks after the first super tuesday. All but North Carolina were slated to be the winner-take-all states, with Illinois and Ohio being by far the biggest prize. Illinois was seen as particularly promising, as its sole republican senator was particularly liberal and well placed in the party, but Ohio would be more of a question mark, its most recent republican senators were conservative, they also both lost their most recent senate elections.
After that would come Wisconsin, a winner take all status. it'd been the only state within a span of almost a month that would need any particular focus. New York, on the 19th of april, would have diminishing returns on investment, as big as it was, given that he was the state's governor and the next set of states would be on the 26th. As such, beyond its solid return on delegates and its winner take all status, Wisconsin was the only truly net positive headline to win over the course of that stretch of the campaign.
As for the 26th itself, Pennsylvania had more delegates than all the other states that would be voting at the time combined, nevermind the fact that it was a winner take-all-states. Winning it would be the utmost importance. It would help that he was born in the state, but no effort could be spared. It would also be an efficient investment, as it was right next to New Jersey and New York, though there'd also be investment in west and central pennsylvania.
Indiana, as a stand alone state, on May 3rd, would be worth investing in, but like Ohio, there existed a significant Consevative-Moderate bend to the local republican party. At that point in the race, that could even be an asset depending on who's left, but it also made it somewhat of a question mark. Its delegate hall wouldn't break the bank either and its importance in headlines is not that clear since it'd at most have about a week to itself.
Of the May 10 states, as per usual, the focus would be on Nebraska as the winner-take-all states. The state had a solidly socially liberal dual republican senate delegation, which would obviously fit well for his success at this point of the campaign, provided that he was still in the race. Oregon and Washington would be worth visiting, if for no other reason than to not snub the west coast in a way that could harm efforts in California, but with smaller delegate hauls to start with and also being proportional, return on campaign infrastructure investment wouldn't be great.
As for the last day of voting, the focus would be, of course, California. It was another case of one state delivering more delegates than all the rest combined and was likely New Jersey would have already had significant run off energy from Pennsylvania and New York. He figured tht if the primary really did come down to these last few states, losing California would almost certainly mean losing the primary.
Though he planned to visit all 50 states at least once, It would be those target states that Nelson would focus on. Come the end of that year's college and university terms in May, he would announce that he was running for president, to get a first swing at that years vacationing students and graduates, to pull them in for volunteering and campaign staff employment.
Other Info:
Children:
Patricia (Born in 1947)
James (Born in 1947)
Sandra (Born in 1949)
David (Born in 1951)
Presidential Campaign Platform:
Nelson's New Construction for a New Decade!
"At many stages in the advance of humanity, this conflict between the men who possess more than they have earned and the men who have earned more than they possess is the central condition of progress. In our day it appears as the struggle of freemen to gain and hold the right of self-government as against the special interests, who twist the methods of free government into machinery for defeating the popular will. At every stage, and under all circumstances, the essence of the struggle is to equalize opportunity, destroy privilege, and give to the life and citizenship of every individual the highest possible value both to himself and to the commonwealth."
~Theodore Roosevelt Jr., 33rd Governor of the State of New York, 26th President of the United States
"What President Teddy Roosevelt spoke of decades ago, despite strides since made, largely by his inspiration, remains true to this day. There's a conflict, between those who possess, through special privilege, won in government bureaucracy, more, than they've earned on one side, with those who've earned more than they've been allowed to posses, due to unjust sanction, on the other. This is a national proble and it requires a federal solution. Yet at once, we must recognize many a large bureaucracy and regulation, has been constructed and implemented under the guise of addressing these problem, only for them to reinforce injustices. We don't require hapzard tweaking tin fundemental unsound institutions, we require New Constructions.
For that purpose, I and my presidential campaign officially put forth this New Construction platform, with the Five Constructions that form its pillars."
~ Robert Nelson, 49th Governor of the State of New York, Republican Presidential Candidate
The Five Constructions
Elimination of Poverty
A Nelson Administration,will commit to reforming public welfare to ensure that all those who work or educate themselves for work, will take home a large enough income to support themselves, trough a reformulation of our system of tax credits, subsidies and federal aid, rather than imposing wage controls and creating wasteful bureacracies that destroy jobs and are disproportionately paid for by small business owners, the average consumer and rural Americans, while making our government a burden on our civil society rather than a complement. The Food Stamp program will be expanded by merging it with agricultural grants and subsidies where feasibly, to sure federal aid translates into fed Americans and rewards our dutiful farmers who know how to meet consumer demand with good product rather than rewarding those who know best how to maneuver through federal bureaucracy. Further more, housing will be addressed to a Federal Housing Initiative that will rectify disastrous inequities created by policies of the Democrat's now defunct Home Owners' Loan Corporation.
Promotion of Entrepreneurship
A Nelson Administration will promote entrepreneurship by investing in infrastructure while cutting burdensome regulations. We will put the factories of the midwest and beyond to work, creating the building blocks, both literal and metaphorical to facilitate the large scale modernization of agricultural, energy and industrial methods across the united states, from South to North, from West to Easts. States will be encouraged to remove sales taxes where they negative effect american Finances. The Farmers Home Administration and Federal Crop Insurance Corporation will be merged into a general purpose Agricultural Bank that trust farmers to make their own investment decisions rather than be forced to mach lockstep to the orders of some distant bureacrat. A Nelson administation will Reviewi of the Soil Conservation and Domestic Allotment Act to provide more freedom for the creation of payrolls that align with market forces rather than state direction. We wll modernize railway regulations to ensure that we have the most well developed railway system in the world for transportation of both goods and people. Additionally, major Investment in nuclear and hydro power will be pursued, alongside the expansion of the use electric rail, with the long term aim of reserving gas and oil usage for heating homes, air travel, personal vehicles and our armed forces. We will furthermore build and maintain in the aerospace sector by raising locking in NASA to 5% of the Federal budget.
Broadening of Public Services
A Nelson Administration will commit to a bold yet responsible reformation of our public services, ensuring every program functions as a direct benefit to the economic and military strength of the nation. This includes child care for women in the workplace to ensuring that women can be mobilized power our nation's industrial capacity as men fight abroad for a world free of fascism. A Nelson Administration supports the creation of a National Benefits Intitive, intended to ensure that small businesses do not fall behind the big businesses competitive in hiring employees when they'd otherwise fall short due to being unable to provide comparable benefits programs, also freeing workers and employers to focus on negotiating wages. By having this work alongside a commitment to an expansion of healthcare for the eldery, we can save administrative and procurement costs on both efforts simultanouesly.
Strengthening of Public Finances
A Nelson Administration will launch a tax reform effort to make the tax code more efficient and ensure that tax revenue increases with economic growth rather than holds economic growth down, in addition to ensuring that the United States has the capacity to uphold it's spending commitments to our citizenry, defending programs like Social Security. To this end, corporate taxes, which are imposed on businesses regardless of size, are to be replaced with a share levy on all publicly traded corporations, with an equivalent tax on private businesses of comparable size, significantly lowering the burden of taxation on small businesses and their owners/ Nelson administration will back a constitutional amendment on equity taxation that would coincide with general income tax relief. Current Social Security payments will be, at minimum, locked in to rise with inflation moving forward. FICA and SECA contribution caps will be removed to ensure fair funding for Social Security. A Federal Permanent Fund will be created, to which FICA and SECA contributions will be paid into for the purpose of ensuring social security savings benefit directly from economic growth, with revenue above that which is required for Social Security working to bolster the federal budget.
Unification of the American People
A Nelson Administration will work to unify the american people by addressing the mistreatment of fellow Americans in the past that reverberates to and continues in the present, using the full enforcement of the constitution as its guideline. The 14th and 15th Amendment will also be respected and enforced, ensuring that the justice system judges individuals by what they do rather than who they are, alongside passing laws to ensure that the way that all the ways in which governments spend within the private sector is consistent with the 14th amendment. The right to vote will be secured for all those that the constitution promises, it regardless of income, race, color or creed. Organized racialist violence will be aggressively fought, through both legal force and community centered programs. Furthermore, Nelson administration will aggressively pursue corruption in the ranks of our trade unions, that harms the interests of workers, managers and consumers alike
Governor Nelson's commitments to these proposals and to his presidential campaign being a movement for change rather than simply a campaign for an office means that he will actively work to see the implementation of as many of these proposals as is feasible as the presidential campaign continues, so that a Nelson Administration will be able to leap to action with a running start.
I have read and accepted the rules of the roleplay: Cybernetic Socialist Republics
Do Not Remove: COLDWAR
Character Application and Information Sheet
NS Nation Name: Cybernetic Socialist Republics
Character Name: Emily Nelson (nee Whelan)
Character Gender: Female
Character Age: 39
Character Date of Birth: February 2nd, 1920
Character Position/Role/Job:
- New York State Representative (1945-1951)
Representative for New York's 12th District (1955-1959)
Class 1 Senator for New York (1959-)
Character State of Residence: New York
Character Party Affiliation:
- Democratic (1938-1950)
Republican (1950-)
Main Strengths:
Feminine Guile:
Has a way with asserting her in intelligence and being convincing without coming across as either conscending. Generally taken seriously when she speaks and has a sort of charisma that makes it suc that she isn't unpleasent to watch or listen to, as long as one dioesn't deeply disagree with what she has to say.
[i]Authentically Town and Country -
Growing up in rural pennsylvania and living most of her life now in cities has made her very capable of appearing authentic to city dwellers and rural americans alike.
Vigorously Moderate Feminist -[/i]
Emily is, unapologetically, a woman in politics with opinions, the desire and the ability to make them heard. While she by no means publicly professes radical views on womanhood and feminism (How could she, to win political office?) She proudly supports those that exist within respected political dialogue.
Main Weaknesses:
Still Female -
Despite her intelligence and appeal, at the end of the day, she's still a woman, and that carries a certain weight on her political career and leads some to make the mistake of assuming that she is where she is thanks to her being the wife of Robert Nelson.
Vengeful -
A Negative aspect of her personality that has followed her since her childhood, helping and sometimes handicaping her, is taste for vengence. She is certainly not one to destroy herself in pursuit of revenge against those she beleives have wronged her, but she will at sometimes forgo the full extent off her own benefit to 'get even.' This
Career Politician -
The last time she ever thought about doing or prepared for work outside of politicias was when she was child. She is a career politician in the purest sense of the word, always looking to hold office and take the next step up in office. Those who put a premium on those who private sector experience can find this aspect at her to be off putting
Biography:
Born on February 2nd, 1920, Emily Nelson (nee Whelan), was born in rural Pennsylvania on a small farm. From birth, her parents wanted her to pursue a higher education and get a profession, they nonetheless ensured that no matter how much ‘intellectual’ work she did, she’d build character from helping with farm work so that she wouldn’t forget her roots. To the benefit of everyone involved, she was inclined towards both physical and intellectual activity.
This went as far as her schooling, where she’d always chafed against limited opportunities for girl’s sports. Indeed, she’d build up her electioneer and politicking skills by running for student council and class president elections, finding all sorts of ways to rally students towards her goals, by convincing other people that her goals aligned with theirs. She would pursue an education in economics, knowing that she was already intending on pursuing a career in politics and wanting to make sure that she had some relevant expertise to be able to point toward.
She still remained active in sports and in some cases got to participate in intercollegiate activities. It was during an event in Massachusetts during her senior year, which she met Robert Nelson had happened to be a spectator at during a trip in which he was visiting the state for a Harvard Alumni event. They would get to know each other and exchange letters, before marrying each other after the end of the pacific war.
But Emily’s career didn’t stop while she waited. Knowing that her soon to be husband lived in New York, she’d start there, finding her way into the office of a democratic New York State Assemblyman. For the 3 years she worked there, she’d work hard establishing connections and when he retired in 1944, she managed to slip through the middle in a primary to become the district candidate. She’d serve there for 3 terms, being highly effective at bringing liberal and moderate democrats and republicans together across party lines, while also throwing herself into state party politics, even as she’d give birth to twins in 1947. In 1950 she expected to get an opportunity to move up into an open state senate seat, only for machine politics to take that opportunity away, stitching up the nomination process against her before it even started.
So she decided to leave the Democratic Party, which she had voted for since she could first vote. Stubbornly, she insisted on running in the general election for the same open senate seat as a Republican, but would go on to lose. She’d spend the next few years embedding herself into the state republican party, while still outside of elected office. While she was happy to see her husband become New York’s Class 1 Senator, she still wanted to continue her career in elected office and she specifically wanted revenge. So she’d wait. In 1954, it appeared that the opportunity had come. She wanted to run for New York’s 10th district for the house of representatives. Her husband insisted that it’d make more sense to run for the 12th. Reluctantly, she agreed.
In her two terms in the house, she’d mostly focus on being a team player, not making a stink of the committees she’d serve on and generally voting the party line. This was all, more or less, to relieve the friction that’d almost inevitably result from her sliding into the Senate spot upon her husband leaving it. Though that was largely eased by the fact that New York Republican party considered him an effective standard bearer for the ‘eastern establishment’ against fusionism.
Having been elected to the senate by a very narrow margin, it was obvious to here now that she appeared to many as the recipient of a sinecure, only in office out of nepotism and machine politics, an ironic fate given now she began the decade. She’s determined now to make it clear that she’s worthy of public office in her own right. She’d won her first election before her husband was even a registered republican, after all.
In that mission, she’d consistently put her self forward to defend and advance civil rights, particularly those of women, even as she makes regular appearances across the country in an effort to increase her husband’s appeal among female republicans.
Other Info:
I have read and accepted the rules of the roleplay: Cybernetic Socialist Republics
Do Not Remove: COLDWAR
